Fall of the Sith
by InvisibleJediMaster
Summary: What if the Sith weren't always evil? Records were found that described the fall of the Sith and creation of the Jedi Order. The records seem to be private recordings left by "Darth Sadas," a Lord of the Sith during the time. A Jedi finds the records....
1. Journal

Record Begins

I am Sith Lord, Darth Sadas, or "Swift as Sky," and I am creating this record because I received a vision from the Force. The vision was of a great darkness falling upon us, with sadly little light escaping. I fear that our society, one of peace and honor, will fall to the Darkness. I sense it coming. It will be a doom the Sith will not escape. It may have already started. Some of the apprentices have not been following the code as closely as is normal, neglecting the Ways of Honor.

5 Moons later

The disregard of the apprentices for the Ways has grown. I sense a shadow has fallen upon us, that the Darkness has been used and the balance in the Force is very slowly shifting. I have spoken of my fears to a few trusted lords and we agreed to try and stop the shift, to reinforce the paths of light upon the Sith and apprentices, but my vision makes me wary. I have had no more messages from the Force, but the first was very clear.

2 Cycles and 1 Moon later

Fighting has begun. It is hidden, limited to back rooms and empty halls, but one can tell, especially one sensitive to the Force. Anger grows among the apprentices. Unrest has reached the Lords, my peers, as was bound to happen. The shadow deepens, but still it is merely a shadow, not the powerful Darkness that I saw.

14 Moons later

Use of the Dark Side has become more widespread, and apprentices have been attacking lords as well as Sith, who have been fighting amongst themsleves. Red lightsabers have become more common among the ones losing their way. I have put away my own red lightsaber crystal in exchange for a blue one because of this trend. Others who are still with me have also been disgarding red lightsaber crystals if they have them. We Sith Lords who have not yet lost sight of the light have grown fewer. Darkness has tainted the Force that has gathered around the temple over many years and it is no longer pure.

3 Moons later

One of the apprentices who has fallen furthest to the Darkness has killed his master, one of our Lords. The other Lords who have fallen are considering raising him to Sith status. That worries me, more than other events. I also believe that open fighting will begin soon because it's been hidden so far. We have begun to consider leaving the Sith Order if the situation grows desperate, which I feel, and fear, it will.

4 Cycles and 3 Moons later

The lines have been drawn. We have fought openly for a few years now. None of the remaining followers of the Ways of Honor have fallen, but the Dark Side has grown stronger each moon and they have focused on killing us instead of fighting amongst themselves, which they still do but not to as great a degree. We Lords have decided to leave and will be telling the other Sith and Apprentices soon. In days long past, there were always more Sith and Apprentices than Sith Lord, but the Dark Side claimed so many that there are now more Lords than either Sith or Apprentices. Apprentices are fewest in number, when they should be greatest.

2 Moons later

We have left our temples, which have fallen to the Sith of the Dark Side. A few have left us to drift as loners, Sith rank only, but most of us are still together. We no longer call ourselves Sith because that name has been tainted by the many fallen Sith. Our council of Lords has decided to call those of us who still follow the Ways of Honor, the _Jedi_. In the old language, it means "Warriors of Honor," for that is what we have become. I will be one of the last honorable Sith, one of the last honorable Lords to bear the title Darth. We are in hiding because the Sith hunt for us. Full out war will begin soon. I had the same vision as long ago, and it has told me that the war will last countless years. Centuries, millenia even.

3 Cycles and 11 Moons later

They keep finding us. The council has decided to decieve the Sith. For Moons we have been giving the younger Jedi, few of whom remain Apprentices, intense training to teach them everything we can. They will leave our current base on the small moon and travel as far as possible, beyond the current range of the Sith. The oldest of us, about half the coucil, will stay behind to fight a last battle to make the Sith think we are finally defeated. Hopefully this will gain the Jedi enough time to flourish and grow strong in numbers, enough to survive against the Sith. The two very oldest lords who cannot fight well any longer but will survive several more years will go with the young Jedi to guide them and provide what wisdom they can.

6 Moons later

The others left about a moon ago, as planned. We have fallen under attack. I was captured once but escaped to give one last message for these records. I have included as many supplementary files as I possibly could, about our Order and the Ways of Honor, about the Sith culture before the Fall, about our history, and more detailed accounts of the developing war. This is in the hope that Jedi will someday find this place to recover the information that those who left could not take with them. The Force barrier I constructed will prevent access by the Sith. If they found the secret records, they would be gone forever and Jedi would never recover this information. My escape won't last long and I must leave this place soon. When they find me again, I will be frozen. They told me this when I was captured, probably as a terror tactic, though it does not frighten me. They even told me where they'd put my body. I included the coordinates so that, if anyone finds them, they can save me and others who were captured and frozen as I was, if they were frozen and taken to the same place. If not, then the coordinates lead to a central Sith base. Use the information how you will. Goodbye. I hope the Jedi survive.

End of Record

(12 Cycles, or years, have passed in total. Each Cycle is 15 Moons, or months, long. 1 Cycle for them is about 2 years for us.)


	2. Part One

Part One of a not-very-long series. Maybe only three or four pieces, not counting the introduction/journal.

* * *

There is no ignorance; there is knowledge.

* * *

Jedi Master Karas Do, a Kel Dor, her Anzati Padawan Shai'fu, and ten of the rehabilitated clone soldiers were approaching an unexplored system at the edge of the Outer Rim, coded as FD-6679-00. The system had two binary stars, a blue dwarf and a red dwarf, with three gas giants, a narrow asteroid belt, and one small, solid satellite. The second gas giant had six moons, and it was to the moon orbiting closest to the purple and white planet that the twelve in the ship were headed for. Their job was to scout out the moon and its two closest orbital neighbors for evidence of sentient life. This entailed hours-long fly-overs for scanning and potential landings to investigate further if necessary. Those tedious hours meant boredom for the two Jedi and ten Clones.

Though no one could see it, Master Karas Do was smiling beneath her anti-ox mask. She couldn't help it because, even though she was deep in meditation, she was aware of her padawan's activities.

"Ha! I got you!" young Shai'fu shouted as there was a smack of a hollow metal pole on standard issue clone armor. He bounced back a step and readjusted--for the eighteenth time now--the 'stolen' clone helmet he wore so he could see through it properly. It was too large for him and kept twisting to the left.

The seven watching clones laughed, as did the two piloting ship who heard the telltale signs of play-combat.

"That wasn't a fair shot," Sparkface said seriously while grinning. He was named for his dark brown hair, cut short like usual, which had strange orange speckling that looked rather like a flare of sparks. The coloring had been caused by an accident, though whenever the padawan inquired about it, all the clones would laugh but not say anything, and Sparkface would have an awkward expression of embarrassment on his face.

Shai'fu lunged in again and tried to strike the clone's groin, which was protected by armor anyway. Sparkface twisted to the side to avoid the thrust of the pipe. "Now you asked for it!" he shouted and, still grinning, dropped his own pipe and leapt at the Anzati, tackling him. They wrestled for a minute or so, rolling around on the floor of the ship, before Shai'fu came out on top, pinning Sparkface down.

"I win!" he declared as he took off the borrowed helmet and put it on its owner's foot. Sparkface strategically flung the thing off and it hit a laughing clone in the chest. Speed, or Speedy as he was somethimes called, stopped laughing with an "oof!" as the helmet hit him, which only made the other six clones laugh all the harder.

"Master Karas Do," called Flyer, who boasted to be the best pilot in the group, from the cockpit, "we've entered orbit around the moon and have begun scanning."

The Kel Dor shifted and rose from her meditation. "Alert us if the scanners pick up anything interesting," she said.

The distraction provided enough opportunity for Sparkface, who caught Shai'fu in the side with his arm, twisted suddenly, and reversed positions with him, putting him on top. He then caught his helmet, which Speed had thrown back at him, and put it awkwardly on the padawan's head.

"No, I win," he said as he got up. He moved to the closet in the corner, opened the door, and started stripping off his armor and putting it back with everyone else's. Shai'fu flipped onto his back and sat up, taking the helmet off as he did so and setting it on the floor.

"Not fair. I got distraced."

Karas Do used the force to put Sparkface's helmet in the closet and said, "You must learn not to get distracted, my young padawan. If that fight had been a real one, you could have been badly injured or worse."

"Yes, master."

Chewy, the other clone who had been in the cockpit--named for an amusing incident involving a drunken rancor--stepped into the main room and looked at the Jedi Master. "Master Karas Do, we've picked up on some structures in a mountainous region near the top of the northern hemisphere. Some life readings, but I think they may be nonsentient."

"Find a place to land. We'll check the site anyway. Everyone, suit up," Karas Do ordered.

Chewy returned to his post. Seven clones and a padawan snickered as Sparkface, who had just shut the closet door, opened it again with an exaggerated roll of his eyes and started putting on the armor that he had just taken off.

"Weather conditions?" Karas Do inquired of the general direction of the cockpit.

Chewy answered back, "Cold, but nothing severe."

Shai'fu, followed by his master, left to find heavier, warmer gear: both were dressed only in light clothing.

In a smaller, closet-like room, the two Jedi stripped off the light outer layers of clothing and began pulling on the thicker, warmer and more numerous cold-weather robes.

"Master," Shai'fu said in a voice muffled by cloth, "I sense that we shall find something here."

"Good. You are listening to the Force. I sense this as well. What else does the Force tell you?"

For a few moments, all that could be heard in the room was the shuffling of cloth as the heavy robes were adjusted. "Just that we'll find something." The padawan quickly pulled a thick shawl, the outer layer of clothing that was specially treated for resilience against the cold, over his head and checked that his lightsaber was secure on his belt.

"Listen closely as we draw near the source, Shai'fu. You may better hear what the Force tells you."

"What do you sense?"

"You will find out as we draw near, my padawan."

"Yes, Master."

They exited the small room and returned to the central area on the ship where the clones were also finishing putting on their armor.

"You almost ready back there? We're coming in on the outer rim of structures."

Everyone waited silently as the ship landed.

"Okay everyone," Flyer stepped out, "we landed on a stone platform, circular, just big enough for the ship. The structures expand out that direction," he gestured at the hatch, which was cycling open. "There's a break in the wind right now. You have a few hours before the windstorm the sensors picked up on get here, so don't take to long or we'll be here longer than we like."

The hatch opened and cold air seeped quickly in. "I'll be waitin' for you here, of course. Now get out before the inside of the ship freezes harder than wampa drool."

Karas Do, Shai'fu and all the clones except Flyer leapt out the hatch and into a landscape that was varying degrees of gray with patches of white and occasional splatters of dark blue from the big, squat, needly plants.

The Jedi Master looked at his padawan who, at the silent signal, faced the clones. "There is no sentient life in this area, but there is something in that tower on the east side of this complex." He glanced at Karas Do as he gave orders, "We'll be going there to search, also, for signs of who built this place and when." Karas Do nodded in approval.

Quickly, upon moving into the city, they could tell it was old. The two Jedi could see the city's age as well as feel it through the Force. It had also become quickly obvious that the city was a massive battlefield. Many buildings were still intact, and several had been destroyed by the weather and time, but there were also several buildings that had collapsed due to other influences with the rubble stacked to perfectly in a pile or with it spread unnaturally far apart.

A mostly-intact wall attracted one of the clones' attention and he went over to inspect the several unnatural markings that were still there after the countless years.

"Hey, this looks like damage from a lightsaber," the clone Trigger waved the Jedi Master over.

"Yes, you are correct," Karas Do confirmed. Shai'fu came over to see and realized his master was right.

"But why would there be lightsaber damage here?" And then he glanced around the area again, taking in all the signs of damage with new recognition. "They're everywhere! But Master, then this city..."

"Seems to have been the stage for a massive Jedi battle, or perhaps the Sith while they were in strength. What does the Force tell you?"

The padawan was quiet for a moment, obviously concentrating on the Force. "There's a shadow over the whole area, but it is really old and faded."

"What else?"

"There's a light spot, over that way." He pointed.

"Very good, Shai'fu." Karas Do looked out over the clones who were alternately watching the Jedi and looking around. "We'll keep going."

After an hour of trekking through snow and rubble, the group found a large complex that seemed the most battle damaged building yet, but also the most solid structure, showing few signs of disrepair from the weather.

"The dark side is stronger here, Master," Shai'fu said after the older Jedi gave him that instructor's expression telling without words that Shai'fu should be analyzing the situation. "But the light spot is here too. I think it might be originating from somewhere on the side of the building."

Master Karas Do looked at the clones. "We're splitting up here. Most of you will be coming with me. Sparkface, Chewy, and Markus, you go with Shai'fu and investigate the perimeter. Contact me when you find anything."

The groups split up accordingly, Shai'fu started walking around the outside to the left, following where the Force was leading him, and Karas Do went straight to the nearest door. It was several minutes before Shai'fu's group had anything to report.

The wrist transmitter on Karas Do's arm lit up and Shai'fu's voice came form it. "I think we found it master. There seems to be a small outside storage area. The door is sealed shut, but the light spot is coming from inside it."

"Good. Continue inspecting the perimeter, and I will meet you at the place when you're finished." Karas Do continued looking around the inside of what he had discovered to be a temple of some kind, probably for the Sith--for the dark side was heaviest here--who'd lived here. Not much had been left behind, because the place had clearly been ransacked long ago, but one of the clones did find a broken light saber in one room under some debris. They came across a few records rooms, but they still smelled of smoke in the still air of the temple and the entire rooms were blackened by fire.

Eventually the two groups met up again outside the small structure Shai'fu had located, the only place that did not emanate with the dark side of the Force. It was protected by a Force barrier that Karas Do told Shai'fu to watch closely as the Jedi Master opened it, unlocking the door in the process.

Karas Do entered first, followed by Shai'fu and two clones. The others stayed outside the door looking in or standing guard.

The room was bigger inside than it seemed it would be, and it was stocked with a simple desk, some shelves, and records. There were a few notebooks, which Shai'fu picked up and flipped through. "Drawings and notes of some kind. I can't read it. Can you, Master?"

Karas Do had activated what seemed like an old version of a datapad. It was a crystalline sheet that had information imprinted on it with the Force. He was scanning through the records when Shai'fu asked his question.

"No, padawan, I cannot, but an old Jedi that I know might be able to."

"The record keeper? The librarian?"

"A friend of the record keeper and a Jedi that has devoted much study to languages and old history. Her name is Lallart."

"Oh."

"We need to bring these records back with us. If they were protected by a Force barrier, they may be important." Karas Do took a pack from one of the clones and carefully loaded it with crystalline sheets. The notebooks and other records from the desk went into a second pack and the assorted items on the shelves--including parts of a lightsaber and a single red crystal--were loaded into a third.

About two hours later every one was back at the ship and they'd taken off just as winds were starting to pick up, signaling the forefront of a storm. Flyer had berated them for not returning sooner and complained that the storm would have trapped them if they'd taken any longer.

* * *

Not my main story of the moment. That would by 'Doorway to Darkness.' But this isn't meant to be super long, so don't get excessively angry if I don't update promptly. Know that I _am_ working on it.


	3. Part Two

After days traveling through hyperspace, the ship of Jedi, clones, and very old records finally reached Coruscant and the main Jedi temple there. It had been rebuilt after the Emperor was overthrown and was now a complex of smaller towers surrounding a monument instead of one massive building complex.

"Don't go very far," the Kel Dor Jedi Master Karas Do told the ship of clones. "We may be requested to depart quickly."

"Yes, Master Karas Do!"

The Jedi Master hefted a second pack filled with old records. One was already shouldered on his back and a third was being carried by the Anzati padawan Shai'fu.

"Come, padawan. We are to meet the council, and Lallart."

Lallart had been informed of the records and arrived on Coruscant a day before, flying from Corellia, her home planet.

Shai'fu, who had been sleeping on the ship until about twenty minutes ago, yawned as he followed his master through a doorway leading off the landing platform their ship was parked on. "Why don't we just take the lift?" he asked as they headed down the stairs.

"Exercise is good for you," the old Jedi responded. "Besides, the council chambers in this tower are near the top level. Using the lift would take just as long."

Within a few minutes, and a few staircases and a hallway later, they stood in the council chamber with five masters physically present. Three others, including Luke Skywalker himself, had holo-feeds as attendance. At the edge of the ring of chairs was Lallart, an old, dark-skinned human wearing loose, pale robes that were obviously well-worn and comfortable.

The records were given to her immediately and Karas Do pulled out one of the crystalline data-pads specifically to hand to her first. He'd had the chance, over the long trip from the Outer Rim, to look over them and had found one specifically that looked like a journal with dated entries. "This one seems to be a personal journal of whoever made the records," he told the historian as justification for the specific selection.

"Interesting," Lallart said as she activated the sheet and began to look over the presented information. "This is extremely old."

"Evidence at the site indicated it was early during the war."

"This is before the calendar was standardized," Lallart explained. "And from the dates themselves, this could be at the very beginning."

Shai'fu gaped. From lessons, he remembered that the old Jedi-Sith war had ended long ago and had lasted a very long time. If the records were from its origin, then they were older than they had first looked.

Lallart looked up abruptly from the slightly-glowing crystal panel. "I will need time to properly translate this; they are among the oldest records I've seen."

"Is there anything else you can discern from the records at this time?"

Lallart sighed. "They do not feel of the dark side, but they were almost definitely written by a Sith."

A few minutes later, Padawan Shai'fu was excused from the council chamber to use his time as he wished.

"Wow. Ancient Sith records?" he spoke aloud to himself as he crossed one of the inter-tower bridges that were opened to the sky. There were covered ones as well, but this one had been the nearest to him, and he needed to get across to another tower to reach his favorite dining hall. "Why would they have been shielded...?"

_'The foolish padawan should know not to speak such...interesting information..._' the spy who caught his words thought to himself as he scurried to a hidden private sled and shot away into the sky to contact his current employer.

Shai'fu felt a twinge from the Force at the spy's departure, but nothing else and it was quickly gone from his thoughts.

A few days later, the council had been called again. Shai'fu was in attendance as well because he and Master Karas Do had found the records in the first place.

"I have finished translating this journal. It was written by a Sith Lord who called himself Darth Sadas. His entries begin before the war and observe its beginnings. Apparently, the dark side crept into influence among his peers, most effectively among the apprentices, over a period of years, and they eventually turned on each other. He mentions several times the 'Ways of Honor,' which I believe to be a creed of some kind, rather like the one held by our Jedi Order. In the later entires of the journal, there are two groups; the normal Sith and those who have fallen to the dark side. The dark ones keep hold of the name Sith, so the others splinter off and leave and rename themselves as the Jedi, a translation of 'Warriors of Honor.' The last entry is a farewell that mentions all the other records and self-sacrifice of nearly all the Sith Lords so the new generation of Jedi can escape and survive. Maps and coordinates are also mentioned, of a Sith stronghold and 'frozen' Sith-turned-Jedi. Because of this, I searched for the maps next, and found this one, which I blended with one of our current maps for comparison."

A hologram appears after a gesture from Lallart showing a section of the Outer Rim, the area Karas Do and Shai'fu had ventured to. All the planets had double entries for their IDs; the first being the current code designation and the second being whatever the Sith had dubbed the planets.

"This is were you found the records," Lallart glanced at Karas Do and pressed a button and the moon the records had been located on flashed yellow instead of blue. "This is the other planet mentioned, with the stronghold." Another moon of a massive gas planet a considerable distance away flashed yellow. It was at least several hours travel between the two--who knows how long it would have taken when the records were first made.

As the council chamber emptied soon afterwards, Lallart handed a data-chip to Karas Do. "This is a copy of the coordinates. The council may ask you to investigate them soon."

Karas Do nodded and pocketed the chip, then pulled his padawan aside and warned him that they may be departing soon. Later, in his private rooms, he notified the ship of bored clones and told them the same. He did not transmit the coordinates, however, because a feeling from the Force told him not to.

Despite that feeling, just before dawn, the chip was stolen from his room. He awakened almost immediately and, though he caught the thief with the aid of his padawan, the data had already been transmitted. The council ordered him to pursue immediately,

The clones, who were all present, had the ship warmed up and ready to go. Karas Do, who remembered the coordinates from looking at Lallart's diagram, input them into the computer for hyperdrive, which was activated as soon as the ship left the gravity well of Coruscant.

* * *

Two more parts left. Probably.


End file.
